Known in the prior art are aircraft wheel and brake assemblies including a non-rotatable wheel support, a wheel mounted to the wheel support for rotation, and a brake disk stack having front and rear axial ends and alternating rotor and stator disks mounted with respect to the wheel support and wheel for relative axial movement. Each rotor disk is coupled to the wheel for rotation therewith and each stator disk is coupled to the wheel support against rotation. A back plate is located at the rear end of the disk stack and a brake head is located at the front end. The brake head houses a plurality of actuator rams that extend to compress the brake disk stack against the back plate. Torque is taken out by the stator disks through a static torque tube or the like.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,095,293 discloses an electric brake and method characterized by the use of actuator modules each of which can be easily and quickly replaced as a unit. This enables quick and easy replacement of the actuator modules without requiring disassembly of the overall brake and wheel assembly. Also, it is conceivable that a malfunctioning actuator module could be replaced on an aircraft and tested with a minimum of equipment preferably quickly enough to allow the aircraft to remain in scheduled service and/or with a minimum of downtime.
A problem arises if an actuator fails in an extended position applying a high compressive force to the brake disk stack. Under such conditions, a high reactionary load will be applied to the failed actuator, making it awkward and difficult to remove the failed actuator.